Tag Archives: dogs

It finally feels like spring and the weather has been fairly dry for a couple of weeks. We had so much rain from September until mid March, we are glad for a bit of drier weather. We don’t want to go into summer dry though. The nice weather allowed eldest son and eldest grand to visit last weekend and they were able to get the deck rails, ballusters, and rail caps completed on the deck.

That makes the deck a usable feature again and as soon as it is truly past freezing nights, pots of flowering plants will be added to one side of the wide steps and some corners of the deck. For now, there are just two chairs out there for sitting in the warm sun on calm warmer days. Ranger the beast, who is suffering from joint pain, has enjoyed a few days laying on the warm deck boards in the sun.

Recently, I found a craft event to be held in May and because I am making soaps for two local museums, I decided to register for the event and make more soaps. Instead of just making loaf molds, some of the soaps are being made using shaped molds, one of sheep, one with a goat, squares, bars, rounds, and smaller ones with geometric and floral patterns on them that are usually used for lotion bars. The only one I don’t like is a pink Passionfruit Rose scented one, but I bet it will sell.

In addition to several batches curing, there are two made this morning that are saponifying for tomorrow’s unmolding.

Those two batches are a sheep and bar mold of citrus scented soap, and a goat and square mold of Goat milk, Oatmeal, and Honey unscented soap. Tomorrow, I will make a batch of Lavender scented, lightly lavender colored sheep and round bars. Each batch that has a surplus of recipe is going into the smaller geometric and floral molds as guest soaps. Special labels have been created for the two museums, Wilderness Road Regional Museum and Edith Bolling Wilson Museum.

When I attended the fiber retreat at Hawk’s Nest State Park the end of February/early March, I was gifted some raw fleece by a friend. Yesterday I finally braved trying to wash one and though I have only done about 10 ounces so far, I am very pleased with the process on the Jacob fleece.

This morning, it looks clean and is nicely dried. I am separating the white, the darkest black, and the gray into three piles and will comb and spin them separately, hoping to be able to knit a gradient shawl from the resulting yarn. There is much more of it in the garage for me to wash and as the afternoon is beautiful, warm, and calm, a couple more batches will be washed and set out on a screen to dry enough to bring in for the night.

The pullets have had no more visits from the Red Tailed Hawk, I hope I have foiled it’s efforts to enter the run. They are now almost 21 weeks old and hopefully will soon start providing us with eggs. They are a pretty flock, though 3 short of what I had hoped for this spring.

Soon it will be time to pull the mulch back from the asparagus, weed a few beds for peas and onions, the start of the planting season. Hopefully, bending down by then won’t still result in dizziness from our accident. It is frustrating how long it is taking to recover from the carelessness of the young lady that hit us.

The ice storm came, half an inch of glassy coating on every surface, but we didn’t lose power.

Followed last night by the first accumulation of snow, only a trace. And wind, freeze your nose off cold. The chickens think it must be my fault. After not letting them out in the ice storm yesterday, the coop was opened this morning and the coop cleaned of “fowled” straw, new straw added. They panicked around me as I did that and then hunkered down in the new straw rather than go out in the cold and snow.

Last night’s break from craft show prep to work on finishing the Christmas stocking for our 7th grand child, born last summer. Each grandchild has a personalized stocking made with love by me. Most given for their first Christmas, but all having one. Now they are all knitted, but our children’s are crewel work and one grandson’s is quilted, but all handmade by me.

Canning was supposed to be done except for enchilada sauce once the peppers are all dried, but the bag of cranberries at the grocer was huge. I guess I could have used part and frozen part, but instead, 4 1/2 pints of cranberry orange relish were made and three of them canned this morning. One left unsealed for Thanksgiving, the small one to be used for oatmeal.

Eldest grandson likes Cranberry sauces and relishes, especially when I make them. Perhaps he can take a jar home after Thanksgiving.

My 200 pound goofy helper sunning his belly in his favorite spot, right behind where I was working.

One of the 4 pumpkins spoiled, so the remaining three will be cooked this afternoon and the pulp frozen in 2 cup amounts for pies and breads for the upcoming holidays. There is a tiny one in the fall table display, it may be cooked and replaced with one of the slightly larger ones so that a stuffed pumpkin can be enjoyed in the near future. The chooks will get the spoiled one with the bad spots removed once they come out of hiding.

The header picture though several years old looks like it did yesterday after the ice and was coated white this morning.

The garden has been neglected except for harvesting tomatoes and cucumbers of late. I did get a second planting of bush beans in a couple of weeks ago and they are sprouting nicely. The garlic needed to be pulled and cured. It went in so late it isn’t a good crop, but hopefully will provide enough to allow a fall planting so next year we will have a good crop and some to enjoy this winter. So the now cured onions were trimmed, the odd double ones, ones with still green necks, and ones with soft spots were culled and moved to the kitchen to be used first.

Then the pulled garlic was laid out on the hardware cloth shelves to cure. Once cured, they will be trimmed and used this winter except for the ones used to plant for next year’s crop.

After spending part of last weekend traveling home from visiting our youngest son and his family, last Sunday on deck destruction with eldest son, part of the week on Historic Camps and destruction clean up, and Saturday on the remaining destruction, I needed a break from pulling brackets and moving heavy lumber. Part of Sunday was spent in the fruit and vegetable garden. Tomatoes and cucumbers picked early in the day, a few blister beetles picked and killed, and while out there, the remaining bean stems pulled and tossed to the chickens. This was a reminder that a couple of beds needed to be worked on and some fall seed planted. A couple of afternoon hours were spent weeding where the beans had been, pulling and hoeing the few weeds that had come up in the bed where the peas had been and half of that bed was seeded with spinach and a leaf lettuce called Drunken Woman. I had to get that one just because I liked it’s name.

The bed that had been the tree nursery was turned and rocks removed, a good thick layer of compost and some bone meal turned and raked in and the blueberry bushes moved into it.

Cardboard was put down beside that bed and the half barrels were moved onto it. The cardboard will kill the weeds under it, leaf mulch will be laid down on top of it and except for an aisle wide enough to keep chicken heads from pecking berries through the fence, that will be the edge of the garden once we have a frost and the pumpkins are harvested.

The pumpkins vines were already spreading to that area so I put them back in place after the cardboard was down.

Layered over that piece of cardboard is the other half of that huge box which may get more half barrels. They are great for growing potatoes and herbs or flowers in the garden. That sheet is being held down by a couple of bags of mulch that are just serving as weights and will be used in a flower bed around the house once leaf mulch or straw is obtained.

Hopefully, this week cabbage and broccoli starts will be available and they will go in the bed with the lettuce and spinach. Perhaps a 6th blueberry shrub will be purchased to add to the blueberry bed. They will hopefully thrive in the enriched deeply dug bed. Once the last one is in place, a thick layer of straw or leaf mulch will placed around them to keep the weed load down.

That will leave only the 4 X 4′ bed that contained the garlic unplanted, and it will be sown with oats that will serve as a cover crop and the seed head given to the chickens, the oat straw can be used as mulch or coop bedding next spring.

I still need to tackle the raspberry bed now that the berry season is over and the Japanese beetles have moved on. I still have a large cardboard box, but will need more to try to smother the wild geraniums and the raspberry volunteer shoots that are encroaching on the aisles and vegetable boxes.

This week between the rain, the rest of the salvageable deck wood will be moved to the barn until it is needed for another project. Eldest son suggested adding a low dry stacked wall off from the existing tall dry stack retaining wall as a means of using some of the tons of rock that were under the old deck.

The chalk line will mark the new wall, eliminating an area that is very difficult to mow because of the steepness and contour that really don’t show well in the photo.

The new deck will stop at the corner you see with steps coming down to where all the rock is, a path of flat stone will cross where the old deck stood over to the stoop where the old steps came down into the yard. A small stone patio will eventually be worked into part of that area, the rest the new garden bed.

Once the new wall is build and backfilled with leaf mulch, the mints, lemon balm, thyme, and rosemary will be planted there. The stones will help keep it warm and they will be allowed to spread and thrive as a perennial herb garden.

Today’s header is a picture we rarely see. Though the pups are best buddies, the Mastiff owns that spot. He used to sleep beside our bed on Jim’s side, but decided he liked the Shepherd’s bed or space. We tried putting both beds there, but he stands over Shadow until she vacates even if he only takes one bed. They were caught sharing the space, each on their own bed.

It is truly autumn here, near 70ºf one day and 40’s to 50’s the next. Sunshine and gloom, but more gloom than sunshine of late.

With the last of the harvest from the garden (still some chard and herbs), it was mulched down last week. The 8 quart bucket of the last of the peppers brought in though I kept forgetting to buy ziplock freezer bags. I avoid the use of plastic for the environment, but some things that go in the freezer don’t have another good option. Son in law picked up a box for me yesterday and last night after dinner, daughter packaged and labelled while I chopped. I didn’t specify how to label them and she tends to be a creative sort when not given specific direction.

There are some interestingly labelled chickens in the freezer for the same reason. It makes me smile each time I pull out one of the packages.

The shorter days have slowed egg production from about a dozen a day down to about 8 a day. It amazes me that with 30 acres to prowl, that those 16 birds can foul their coop so thoroughly as quickly as they do. This morning, I could smell ammonia again, so I opened the pop door, the coop door, and all three windows fully to hopefully dry some of the straw, but hardly got back in the house when thick gloom formed again. A weather app check said rain was due before 10 a.m. With the garden dormant and a winter to break down the hot fertilizer, I forked the fouled straw out of the coop and onto the dormant beds and spread new straw in the coop, closed the main door and lowered the windows to a ventilating crack. Back in the house, only 8:30 and the rain has already begun.

I hope the rain will stop by early afternoon. Jim and I have been working together for the past 8 weeks to improve our health. This has included behaving better at meals and eliminating most snacks, altering the types of snacks we do eat, and walking daily. We started with a bit over 2 miles at a pace the hare would laugh at, but yesterday we did 3 miles at 15.05 minutes/mile. He is willing to go to the gym and walk the treadmill, I am not, plus we don’t encourage each other doing it that way. I walk faster when I am with him and I think he does also, so I don’t like rainy days that interfere. When it gets cold, he will go to the gym, I will layer up and continue to walk outdoors if it isn’t raining. So far, though I don’t see much weight change, I have dropped a size in my jeans and had to purchase a couple of new pair yesterday as I was constantly pulling the old ones up.

The first Holiday Market is coming up and I am spending car time and evenings, knitting hats and fingerless mitts with small skeins of hand spun yarns.

If the day is cool or windy, hopefully they will sell. Each new item also goes into my online shop with the link on the side of the blog.

Lately, I have been missing my Dad. It is approaching two years since he took sick and passed. On Halloween, while looking for a photo of my daughter doing professional grade Darth Maul makeup on her little brother to show her son who she was doing as the Joker from Batman, I stumbled on this photo from many (maybe a dozen) years ago at a holiday meal at his home. This is my sister and me with Dad with a silly smirk that I saw so often. I’m not sure why my little brother wasn’t in the picture as well.

I had much shorter and much darker hair back then. This morning, while sitting and eating my breakfast, I was watching the birds on the feeders. Please excuse the dirty window, I can’t go safely out on the deck to clean it.

He always had feeders full for the birds and squirrels and most of the ones I can name when they visit are because of his lessons.

One of the things I really miss is our weekly call that always had a discussion of what we were currently reading and his recommendations of many excellent books I have read over the years because of him. I did have a nice long conversation with my step mom yesterday though.

I think I will end with a picture of the best buds.

They had been wrestling over a ball and she putting her whole head in his mouth, but then they they just collapsed into a puppy pile to snuggle.

This week has been busy and atypical. Last Sunday, I drove Son #1 and Grandson #1 back to Northern Virginia from a weekend visit with us. The plan had been to work on the staining of the south and west walls of the house, but again, it rained. This gave them some much needed down time. Son #1 and I did succeed in getting the leg leveling hardware on the extension ladder. I had twice decided to do it myself and the first time I was too foggy headed with a cold and the second time, realized that because the rungs of the ladder extended through the fiberglass uprails, that it wasn’t as straight forward as hoped and I didn’t want to ruin the ladder. It turned out that we had to go to Lowes and buy more aluminum metal strap to make spacers as the package did not come with enough to do the job.

They took a hike in the drizzle and fog at the top of the mountain and took Grandson that lives with us too. They came back wet, tired and just in time for a dinner of Empanadas and Yellow Rice that always pleases everyone. I used some of the last of the tomatoes and peppers to make a homemade Pico de Gallo with black beans and Daughter made a roasted Tomatillo salsa that was very tasty as toppers.

Son #1 and Grandson#1 took a mountain bike ride on the neighbor’s hill and up the gravel road off of which we live. Sunday, before we left, Son #1 and I took down a dead tree and he started cutting it into firewood lengths. I hauled loads up in the back of my car and in the tractor bucket and now I need to split and stack it. He will finish cutting it up when he comes again, maybe over Thanksgiving weekend.

Monday was spent being Grandmom in charge in Northern Virginia as Grandson #1 had a Columbus Day vacation from school. We took the Metro into D.C. and spent some time in the Q-rius lab in the Natural History Museum. That is quite a set up and Grandson #1 loves it. We also walked through the history of the earth, erosion, meteor impact and minerals areas which he also enjoys.

Tuesday was travel back home with several calls from Mountaingdad that the roofers had showed up to realign and refasten the gutters, fix the leaking vent stack and attach snow guards to the front and back roofs. This brought to our attention another less than stellar installation by our original contractor in that the metal roofing was not fastened down with enough screws and some of the screws were not even secured into anything when they tried to tighten them down. We now have a second contract with this roofer to come back and make our decade old metal roof more secure. We do now have snow guards to try to help prevent the snow from sliding off and taking out the gutters and making snow drifts across the front of the house and piling up on the south deck.

By Wednesday, they were beginning to threaten us with our first freeze due tonight, tomorrow, and Monday, so final harvest was undertaken. The 5 gallon bucket of peppers that I brought in are all in the process of being preserved. Three more pints of Jalapenos were pickled. A quart of hot pepper sauce (mostly Tabascos, but a few Habeneros added in) was made and canned in 8 ounce jars. The smaller green bells sliced or diced and frozen for winter use, the larger ones will be stuffed with rice and ground meat and eaten for dinner this weekend. The first two pans of Anchos are in a very low oven drying now and the house is filling with the spicy aroma they are emitting.

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There is a string of ripe Anchos hanging in the breezeway south windows and at least two more pans full to oven dry.

The potted herbs and houseplants cleaned, pruned and tucked in corners and window sills to try to get at least a few more weeks of fresh herbs from them.

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The garden was turned over to the laying hen flock and they are quickly cleaning it up. They have revealed many more pumpkins that I will harvest before tonight’s frost. If you look in the picture above, you will see our grass mowing neighbor, on the other side of the garden and chicken pens, she pays us daily visits. I don’t generally mind her visiting, but yesterday, she came right up to the house and left two large gifts that cows tend to leave. The dogs went straight to one and the German Shepherd did what dogs will do and rubbed her face and side in it. That prompted an afternoon bath as it was too cool outside to hose her down with cold water. While she was wet and wrapped in towels, we pinned her down and cut her nails. She really gets frantic when you do her nails and it requires three of us to do her. I ended up getting bitten before I got her head pinned down with a towel and my forearm. The other two dogs and Daughter’s two cats also got theirs done while we were at it. It is nice to not hear the click, click of them walking on the hardwood.

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The front porch got a fall touch, the fall Welcome garden flag and the large Halloween flag hung.

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Girlie Cat (the name she came with), our barn kitty enjoying the warm sun on the front porch.

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Much of our fall color is already gone at our elevation, the trees already getting bare of leaves. It won’t be much longer before the only color at all is the green of the evergreens, cedars and pines scattered about.

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Though there was some scattered frost lower on the mountain this morning, we ventured to the Farmers’ Market, got what will probably be my last bouquet from Stonecrop Farms for this season and supplied with some beef and pork, greens, beets, carrots, potatoes and green beans to enjoy this week. We will continue to be able to get some meat and produce at the market for at least a few more weeks before many of the vendors pack it in for the year until next spring.

We love our life on the farm at all seasons. It is moving into a slower, hunker down and stay warm period of more reading, knitting and spinning and no garden work. I do still have to clear a bed and plant the garlic next week after our three nights of freezing temperatures and it moderates again for a while.

Mountaingdad and an adorable Grand waiting for the July 4 parade.Old CarsWagonsThe Village Historian

Village parades are fun. The local politicians up for election, old cars, all of the village Emergency vehicles, horses, motorcycles, kids on ATV’s, tractors. If you want to be in the parade, show up and they will line you up. Most of the floats, politicians, service organizations, and the fire department, all throw candy and granddaughter came home with a whole bag full because she was so cute in her little red, white, and blue dress. After the parade, there are hot dogs and burgers, salads, beans, and desserts for a donation of your choice and means held on the village green.

After our local parade, we went to the one in the university town nearby and she got more candy, balloons, flags and attention. Our day ended in the same town watching the fireworks.

Music, kids playing and finally dark and a fireworks display.

A poor pup. She has again developed an infection and she won’t stop licking. An expensive vet visit and she is on antibiotics, anti-inflammatories, and an Elizabethan collar to try to break the cycle. She can’t eat or drink with the collar, so we bought this type to use when we are around and can keep an eye on her. She can still lick herself in this one, but it serves as a reminder, more to us than to her, but she can eat and drink with this one and will go outside to relieve herself. She has to wear the more restrictive one when we are out of the house and at night.

We feel like we need a boat and the garden is a mess of weeds. I weed and it rains and they grow some more. We are getting squash. We enjoyed the last of the peas, chopped and froze a couple cups of Mammoth Jalapenos. Today was finally dry, but it was miserably hot and humid and ended with showers and a double rainbow. And more rain due for the next week. The ground is saturated, the creeks full and each day of rain produces flash flood warnings.

Son #1 and Grandson #1 are coming tomorrow night and we are hoping to get the chicken coop for the cull birds secured and will isolate them before the last broody hen hatches next week. There needs to be some fencing completed so the culls will have a run too.

The chick family ended up with only 6 of the 10 chicks hatched, but they are adorable little yellow fluff balls and Momma Hen is taking good care of them. Tonight I am a bit worried as it is going down to 40 f, but she had them tucked firmly under her fluffed body.

We had been letting the Buffys and the Americauna middles free range hoping that the pecking order would be established without incident. Each evening, the middles were always reluctant to enter the coop. If I rounded them all up during the day to allow the dogs outside time, I would usually find the middles and 1 or 2 Buffys outside the pen within an hour or so. To try to keep the Buffys from escaping, I clipped the wings on the two that could get out. I was considering clipping the wings on the Americaunas too until yesterday evening when I found one of the clipped wing Buffys had been caught outside of the pen by one of the dogs and she couldn’t get away. Unfortunately, she didn’t survive the attack and I am now down two hens this spring. Today, I left them penned up all day and by this afternoon, a Buffy and all 4 Americaunas were out. I got them penned up about an hour before dark and by the time I went out to close up the coop, one of the middles was out again. I’m in a quandry as to how to deal with it. The run is 4′ welded wire fence. I can’t put a top on it and still be able to move about in the run if necessary. I can’t let them free range as long as the Golden is going to chase and catch them. I am trying to figure the least expensive solution that might also provide some shade as they killed the peach tree that was in their run by destroying the bark last summer. A hoop house or a 6 foot topped run of dog panels. I have seen plans for hoop houses made of bull panels, and others made of bent pipe. Decisions to be made.

Today was spinning day with the group. One of my friends in the group has a little rescued terrier dog that participates in Flyball and as a fund raiser, they put together baskets. I provided some of my soaps and lotion bars to a couple of their baskets and she, being a very talented seamstress with nice machines offered to make me a needle case for one of my sets of interchangeable knitting needles. I had purchased one from an Etsy shop that I liked, but saw some flaws in it that she and I discussed when we were sharing a room at the spinning retreat in February. I bought a couple of batik fat quarters and she engineered the case to correct the flaws. I love it.

When I got home to put my needles in the case, I found the cutest little sheep attached to the end of the zipper.

This week has been marked with disruption and illness. There was no school midweek for a teacher workday then a 2 hour delay that turned into a closed day because of a light snowfall and strong wind on Friday. We have been experiencing cold nights and damp cold days and Romeo, our Buff Orpington rooster, a calm gentle fellow had a serious case of comb and waddles frostbite. He may not be such a handsome fellow by the end of winter.

This was taken before his frostbite. He is a good guardian to his hens and gentle to them in his ardor. As the days are lengthening, we are beginning to get more eggs, up to half a dozen one day. These are welcomed, with 5 of us in the household now, we use many more than I did before.
Yellow Cat, a rescued barn cat, obtained as a sickly kitten lived out his life this week. We had been told he would likely only live a couple of years as he had feline Aids and it finally took its toll on his fragile immune system. I found him on his bed on the porch yesterday with no life left.

RIP Yellow Cat.
For a couple of weeks, we have noticed our German Shepherd licking herself more than routine cleaning would require. A vet trip to have her checked out and to get her nails clipped as it takes two people to hold her down while one clips, revealed that she had malformed lady parts that have become inflamed, likely infected so she is receiving antibiotics once a day and pain meds twice. This sounds like an easy process, but she doesn’t take pills, even flavored chewables and you risk your digits to try to force them. She can remove a pill from cheese, peanut butter, meatballs, any trick in the book. Daughter who used to be a vet nurse was going to be the pill giver, but the Vet gave us a can of prescriptive canned food and suggested putting the pill in a small meatball of it and magic, she gobbles the pills right down. A solution to a three year old problem, yay.
I was to leave on a bus today to Northern Virginia to babysit Grandson #1 tomorrow and return home with my car on Tuesday. Last evening, Son#1 sent a text and suggested that I try to change my reservation for the bus as they had a stomach virus spreading through their region and he had come down with it. Not wanting to catch it myself nor bring it back to our household, my car will have to stay for another bit. I hope they don’t all catch and suffer the virus.
Another week on our farm, I can’t believe it is February and in two short weeks, Mountaingdad and I will celebrate 37 years of marriage and in three weeks, our baby will turn 28. It can’t be so.

Last night around midnight, I was sleeping and Mountaingdad was watching television and there was a light rapping on our door. Of course the house alarm, two big dogs went berserk. The rapping was Son#2, our youngest and his family surprising us with a weekend visit. We had seen them a couple of weeks ago at their home and thought they were coming in January to visit once daughter and her family had moved up from Florida. Since Son#1 and his family had left on Christmas Day, I had stripped and washed the bed linens, but not remade the beds yet, so a quick bed making was done, a bit of visiting then everyone drifted off to bedrooms.

Since our usual Saturday routine is to go to the town, have breakfast and then on to the Farmers’ Market for whatever offerings are available, we all went in together. Being a small town with a large state university, with the students all home for the holidays many of the local businesses take a week off and our first breakfast choice was closed. We did finally get some food, bought our week’s meat ration and a bit for the freezer and came home to more visiting. The children are ages 8 and 3. They both want us to play with them as they don’t see us often. We enjoy this time but wear out much faster than the kids.

After being intimidated by the big dog at first this morning, the 3 year old has decided that he makes a good pillow and is the gentle giant that he is.

The other pup, our German Shepherd has hidden upstairs most of the day, totally overwhelmed by the activity. She better get used to it as the Florida grands moving here next week are the same ages.

Their visit will be short, they will be leaving in the morning as Son#2 is an advanced life support paramedic and has one of his monthly volunteer shifts to serve tomorrow night, followed by a day of paid work on Monday, so he needs to get home and hopefully get a nap before his shift.

It is cold and raining. Not the biting cold of last week, that is due again tomorrow, but cold enough to make procrastination on outdoor chores inevitable. I cuddled in bed with my book until the Shadow, the German Shepherd was dancing cross legged by my side of the bed, Ranger, the big guy still lazing on his pad on the floor by Mountaingdad.

It is wet enough that the pups didn’t want to stay outside very long, not long enough for me to finish prepping their eggs, so they hovered around and behind me while I cooked. The recalcitrant hens producing barely enough eggs to have for home use and as I used one of yesterday’s 3 eggs to make cornbread last night for a meal we shared with our recently widowed neighbor after the Pipeline Opposition meeting, there were only two to cook this morning. Once I carton a dozen and put them in the refrigerator for neighbors or friends, I leave them alone and only use from the bowl on the counter. This left me with no egg today, but I had leftover cornbread, a wedge lightly buttered and toasted in a cast iron skillet is a treat to be savored, with or without an egg. The pan was heating to cook the pups eggs, so I got my cornbread first.

With the house critters (including me) fed, it was getting harder to stall about layering up in gumboots, coat and gloves and finally making the wet, chilly walk over to let the chooks out and to feed and water them. Their sloped run, bare of a single blade of grass and with the hay scratched and washed off was as slick as ice. It is too wet to uncover the big round bale of hay to throw more down at the gate, hopefully later it will quit raining long enough to accomplish that task. Their coop hay tossed to loosen it up for insulation and turned to facilitate the deep litter composting that produces heat for them, their feed served in two metal dog bowls to keep it from being trampled into the mud and a quick check of nesting boxes for cleanliness and I found a surprise.

Three fresh, warm eggs to keep my hands warm as I slogged back to the house. I haven’t seen morning eggs in weeks and am luck to find 3 or 4 cold eggs in the evenings. It would be nice to get back to going out and finding more than I can carry in without a basket, but maybe not until springtime.

If it is going to be wet and cold, it should at least be white. I’d settle for the mountain snow flurries that fall for days on end with no real accumulation, just the dusting on gardens, roofs and cars. Cold, rainy winters remind me of winters on the coast, you are supposed to have snow in the mountains. I know, I should be careful of what I wish for, we may find ourselves snowed in without power later in the winter and we haven’t laid in wood for the stove and fireplace, having only a bit left over from last year. I suppose we should set in an emergency supply at least.